DEADLINE TODAY: There’s no indication the White House plans to meet a request to provide by today any evidence to back up President Trump’s explosive charge that his predecessor President Obama wiretapped Trump Tower a month before the election last year. The heads of the House Intelligence Committee, Republican chairman Devin Nunes and ranking Democrat Adam Schiff, sent a letter last week to the Justice Department asking for all relevant documents. As recently as Friday, Schiff said he had not seen any proof to back up Trump’s accusation, even after participating in a classified meeting with FBI Director James Comey.
“I think the president has one of two choices, either retract or to provide the information that the American people deserve,” said Sen. John McCain on CNN Sunday. “But I also believe that the president of the United States could clear this up in a minute. All he has to do is pick up the phone, call the director of the CIA, director of national intelligence, and say, OK, what happened? Because they certainly should know whether the former president of the United States was wiretapping Trump Tower.”
So far there is also no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Moscow, despite widespread suspicions and speculation by Democrats. In fact, the former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper has said that as of the time he left office Jan. 20, there was no such evidence.
But McCain is unconvinced. On CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday program McCain said, “There’s a lot of aspects of this whole relationship with Russia and Vladimir Putin that requires further scrutiny, and so far I don’t think the American people have gotten all the answers. In fact, I think there’s a lot more shoes to drop from this centipede.”
The 2008 GOP presidential nominee said a number of Trump’s campaign and transition associates, including Roger Stone, need to be called to testify by the House and Senate intelligence committees. In particular, McCain is suspicious about an incident at the Republican National Convention last summer. “For example, why was the provision in the Republican platform that called for the provision of defensive weapons to Ukraine, after being invaded by Russia, why was that taken out of the Republican platform?” McCain asked. “Clearly, it was not the will of most Republicans.”
Good Monday morning and welcome to Jamie McIntyre’s Daily on Defense, compiled by Washington Examiner National Security Senior Writer Jamie McIntyre (@jamiejmcintyre), National Security Writer Jacqueline Klimas (@jacqklimas) and Senior Editor David Brown (@dave_brown24). Email us here for tips, suggestions, calendar items and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email and we’ll be sure to add you to our list.
MUST SEE TV! I will be a guest this morning, 9:20 a.m. on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal to discuss North Korea, missile defense, and other national security issues. Tune in, or watch the live stream on c-span.org.
ROT IN THE CORPS: This is not how the Marine Corps’ top general was planning to spend his week. Commandant Gen. Robert Neller had planned a trip to the Arctic circle to see his Marines training with NATO troops, but instead he will be testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee tomorrow about the burgeoning scandal of Marines savaging female service members on a private social media site. Initially reported as involving Marines sharing nude photos of women while disparaging them with misogynist comments, it’s become clear that the problem is wider than that, including pictures of women fully clothed, and taken from Facebook pages and other public sites for the purpose of private ridicule.
On Friday, Neller was at a loss to explain what was going on in what he called a “subculture” of the Marines. His disappointment and exasperation was palpable as he stood at the podium at the Pentagon briefing room, and tried to come to grips with why so many Marines appear unwilling to accept women in their ranks.
“We’ve been fighting for 15 years. You know, men and women, side by side. OK. And women, they did their — they did their thing and I don’t know what else they got to do to like say, yes, OK, good to go,” Neller said, almost pleading. “What do you got to do to get in? I mean, come on, guys. They just want to do their job. Let them do their job and you do yours. And you know what? It’ll all work out.”
If you want to get an idea of how deep the problem is, and how long it’s been around, just read this post from Brian Adam Jones, co-founder and editor-at-large of Task & Purpose, who is a veteran of the Marine Corps and of the war in Afghanistan. He reported on the very same problem three years ago, but was met with indifference. “This sexism, as vile as it looks in this form, is not new. The way these Marines on social media are fighting for their ability to be sexist says as much about the problem as the sexism itself.” Jones writes. “This is a deeply ingrained cultural issue that must be addressed transparently and aggressively, or it won’t change.”
UPARMORING WOMEN: A Marine Corps three-star who went up to Capitol last week to testify about readiness ended up getting an earful about how long it is taking to get better fitting body armor for women warriors. Lt. Gen. Gary Thomas was questioned by Rep. Salud Carbajal, who is a former Marine. “It just doesn’t bode well, especially when you consider incidences that we’re dealing with, the allegations that we’re dealing with, it just doesn’t bode well for the type of institution we want to portray to our country,” Carbajal said. Thomas said the service is putting out new sizes to better accommodate women, but has not copied changes the Army has already made to actually better fit a woman’s body.
READINESS PROBLEMS: Thomas repeated the Marine Corps’ recurring complaint that spending caps have resulted in a severe aviation readiness problem, noting that fewer than half of the service’s aircraft are ready to fly at any given time. That leaves the Marines significantly short of their goal of 75 percent readiness in the aviation fleet. Thomas told members of the House Armed Services Committee that, while readiness across the Marine Corps is on an upward trend, readiness in the aviation community is “still much lower than we would like.”
THE MOSUL FIGHT: Iraqi forces are reported to be making slow and steady progress in vanquishing the remnants of the Islamic State in Mosul. Sixty-percent of the west bank of the Tigris River is said be under Iraqi government control, but as many as 100,000 civilians have been displaced as they flee the fierce fighting.
AQAP, THE NEW ISIS? With the Islamic State apparently in its death throes in Iraq and Syria, some experts say Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is a more direct threat to the U.S. homeland. The recent uptick in U.S. airstrikes and the controversial SEAL Team 6 raid are just some of the indicators that AQAP is seen as the most dangerous arm of al Qaeda. “We strongly believe that AQAP remains intent on attacking the West,” a senior defense official involved in counterterrorism told reporters at the Pentagon recently. “AQAP is constantly near the top when we rack and stack threats to the homeland from terrorist groups.”
OBJECTION NOTED: Not that Bashar Assad has any say in the matter, but for the record the Syrian president insists any U.S. troops coming to Syria to fight the Islamic State are “invaders” because they don’t have his permission to enter the country. Any troops that come into the country without Syria’s permission would be invaders whether they are from the U.S., or Turkey, Assad said, according to CNN. Assad also said there has been no “concrete action” from the Trump administration on ISIS.
OA-X COMPETITION HEATS UP: Textron Aviation is expecting to participate in the exercise planned for this summer to help award a contract for the Air Force’s light-attack jet. A spokeswoman for the company said she is “confident” the Scorpion jet and the AT-6 Wolverine are both “exceptional platforms to fulfill the light-attack mission.”
MISSILE DEPLOYMENT STILL ON: U.S. officials are proceeding with the deployment of a missile defense battery in South Korea despite the impeachment and removal of the South Korean president Park Geun-hye, Joel Gehrke writes. “Leaders change over time, that’s not new,” Navy. Capt. Jeff Davis, Pentagon spokesman, told reporters Friday. “This is something that is needed militarily. That agreement was reached and we remain committed to delivering on it.”
U.S. leaders are likely to have a new sense of “urgency” to deploy the missile defense battery. “I think that there’s going to be an urgency by our military, which I support, to put the THAAD in South Korea before the South Korean election,” Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, who sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told the Washington Examiner. THAAD is the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system.
TILLERSON NOT INCLUDED: When Mexico’s top diplomat came to Washington last week, he went directly to the White House, and skipped the State Department. Instead of meeting with his U.S. counterpart Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray met with Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and adviser the president, and other White House aides including national security adviser H.R. McMaster. Embarrassingly, State Department spokesman Mark Toner didn’t even seem to know that Videgaray was visiting. Asked if there would be any meetings at State, Toner said, “Good question. We’ll take that and get back to you. I was unaware that he was, the foreign minister, was in town, and I’m not sure.”
NO ROOM FOR REPORTERS: Tillerson’s decision not to travel with reporters when he visits Asia this week will only lead to “distrust,” a Democratic senator charged Friday. “Restricting the public’s access to information only foments distrust,” Sen. Ed Markey, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee that oversees the State Department, wrote to Tillerson on Friday. Tillerson leaves this week for crucial talks with China, Japan and South Korea about the growing threat from North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.
The White House insists the break with the tradition of including traveling press is nothing personal, it’s just that as a “cost-saving” measure, the secretary is taking a smaller plane that can’t accommodate extra passengers. Press secretary Sean Spicer insists reporters are welcome to cover Tillerson, they just won’t be on the plane with him, as they have in the past. “There has been a press component to every stop of the secretary’s trip,” Spicer said Friday. “He is doing everything he can to logistically support the press who wants to come and cover him. And they are being open to make sure that the secretary’s available throughout the trip.”
NOT JUST TRUMP: People associated with Hillary Clinton’s campaign have also met with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, according to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman. “Well, if you look at some people connected with Hillary Clinton during her campaign, you would probably see that [the Russian ambassador] had lots of meetings of that kind,” Dmitry Peskov told CNN in an interview that aired Sunday. Peskov said none of the meetings between campaigns and Kislyak were about the election.
THE QUOTABLE COLONEL RETURNS: Army Col. Steve Warren, one of the post quotable and popular public affairs officers, is hanging up his uniform and returning to the Office of the Secretary of Defense as principal deputy assistant secretary for public affairs. I inaccurately tweeted last week that Warren will fill the duties of spokesman, but I regret to say I was misinformed. Warren will play a mostly behind-the-scenes role, providing steady guidance as he did when he headed Press Operations at the Pentagon, and was chief U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad. Sources say he was hoping to be the man at the podium, in the model of retired Rear Adm. John Kirby, but he is happy to serve in the senior position.
THE RUNDOWN
Daily Beast: The Admiral Staring Down Putin’s Subs
Reuters: Exclusive: Japan plans to send largest warship to South China Sea, sources say
New York Times: Turkey’s Relations With Europe Sink Amid Quarrel With Netherlands
New York Times: Trump Administration Is Said to Be Working to Loosen Counterterrorism Rules
Fox News: Mattis’ Pentagon pick seen as supporter of Muslim Brotherhood, group Trump may outlaw
Defense One: Better Tech Is Arriving to Defend Against North Korean Missiles. It Won’t Cool Regional Tensions
UPI: U.S. Army seeks larger munitions stockpile, citing ‘readiness crisis’
Military Times: Defense lawmakers take aim at fixing the ‘widow’s tax’
Task and Purpose: Veterans In Government ‘Get Stuff Done,’ Says SEAL-Turned-Congressman
Defense News: Pound drop not impacting short-term U.K. military spending: official
Military.com: Hearing Set for Drill Instructor Linked to Muslim Recruit’s Suicide
AP: AP’s legendary ‘Napalm Girl’ photographer Nick Ut to retire
Calendar
TUESDAY | MARCH 14
10 a.m. Dirksen G-50. Gen. Robert Neller testifies before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the Marines United scandal. armed-services.senate.gov
11 a.m. 1300 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. Sharon Weinberger of the Woodrow Wilson Institute discusses her new book on DARPA, The Imagineers of War. wilsoncenter.org
WEDNESDAY | MARCH 15
9 a.m. 1789 Massachusetts Ave. A panel discusses the defense budget and emergency war spending. aei.org
10 a.m. Rayburn 2118. Gen. Joseph Votel, the leader of U.S. Central Command, testifies on challenges facing the U.S. in the Middle East. armedservices.house.gov
10:30 a.m. Senate Visitor’s Center 217. Vice Adm. James Syring, the director of the Missile Defense Agency, provides a closed briefing to lawmakers. appropriations.senate.gov
3:30 p.m. Russell 232-A. A panel of experts testifies on all arms warfare in the 21st century. armed-services.senate.gov
THURSDAY | MARCH 16
7:00 a.m. Lt. Gen. Arnold Bunch from the office of the assistant secretary of the Air Force for acquisition speaks at an Air Force Association breakfast event. afa.org
8 a.m. Rayburn 2118. A panel of Navy witnesses testifies on the current state of the service. armedservices.house.gov
9 a.m. 1030 15th St. NW. Rep. Seth Moulton and Rep. Brad Wenstrup talk about America’s place in the world and foreign policy strategy. atlanticcouncil.org
2 p.m. 529 14th St. NW. Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Paul Zukunft delivers his annual State of the Coast Guard address. press.org
